One-Quarter of World's Coral Reefs Destroyed

More than a quarter of the world’s coral reefs have been destroyed by pollution and global warming and unless drastic measures are taken, most of the remaining reefs may be dead in 20 years, scientists said today.

In some of the worst-hit areas, such as the Maldives and Seychelles islands in the Indian Ocean, up to 90 percent of coral reefs have been killed over the past two years by an increase in water temperature.

“You have to go and look at the coral reefs now, as we are losing them,” said Clive Wilkinson, a leading Australian scientist.

Pockets of Ecosystems

Coral reefs, the “rain forests of the sea,” play a crucial role in the oceans as an anchor for most marine ecosystems. Their loss would place thousands of species of fish and other marine life at risk of extinction.

Researchers told the 1,500 delegates from 52 countries attending the 9th International Coral Reef Symposium on Indonesia’s tourist island of Bali that governments must “wake up” and urgently reverse global warming trends, cut pollution and crack down on over-fishing.

In some areas fishermen use dynamite or cyanide to catch fish, blowing the reefs apart or poisoning them, Wilkinson said. In other areas, governments are pumping untreated sewage and other poisonous waste directly into oceans.

But the scientists emphasized that the most serious and immediate threat to the world’s reefs is global warming, which is causing a damaging condition known as coral bleaching.

Warming Waters

The term describes a condition where higher water temperatures heat the coral, which becomes stressed and expels the microscopic plants that give it its vibrant color. If the coral is not cooled, it dies.

Oceanographers say that the El Niño weather pattern two years ago, which led to a rise in water temperatures by up to 6 degrees Fahrenheit, did enormous damage to the coral reefs, some of which had been alive for up to 2.5 million years.